Stalbridge Weston Manor: Historical Timeline

933 to c.1760 · Monarchs · Lords of the Manor · Key Documents · Key Events

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Jump to: Anglo-Saxon Medieval Tudor Stuart Georgian

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The Anglo-Saxon Period

933–1066

924–939

Monarch King Æthelstan

933

The earliest surviving document relating to Stalbridge Weston: a grant by King Æthelstan on 26 January 933 of ‘5 (or 8) hides at Weston’ to Sherborne Minster.

Electronic Sawyer, S 423

933–1539

For over 600 years, the manor was held by the ecclesiastical institution at Sherborne: first as Sherborne Minster from 933, then as a Benedictine Abbey after 998.

939–946

Monarch King Edmund I

946–955

Monarch King Eadred

955–959

Monarch King Eadwig

959–975

Monarch King Edgar the Peaceful

975–978

Monarch King Edward the Martyr

978–1016

Monarch King Æthelred II, ‘the Unready’

998

Granted permission to convert the Sherborne monastic community to follow the Benedictine rule, and confirmed the 8 hides held by Sherborne at Weston.

Electronic Sawyer, ‘S 895’.

1013–1014

Monarch King Sweyn Forkbeard

1016

Monarch King Edmund Ironside

1016–1035

Monarch King Cnut

1035–1040

Monarch King Harold Harefoot

1040–1042

Monarch King Harthacnut

1042–1066

Monarch King Edward the Confessor

1066

Monarch King Harold II

1066

William of Normandy arrived in 1066, and earned himself the title William the Conqueror. The Anglo-Saxon ruling elite was replaced by a Norman one.

1086

A royal survey recording who held which lands in much of England and parts of Wales, what resources and people were there, and what it was all worth for taxation.

Open Domesday Project

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The Medieval Period

1066–1485

1066–1087

Monarch King William I

1087–1100

Monarch King William II

1100–1135

Monarch King Henry I

1135–1154

Monarch King Stephen

c. 1135–1153

A prolonged civil war during which royal power fragmented and law and order collapsed as rival barons and warlords filled the vacuum left by a weakened crown.

1154–1189

Monarch King Henry II

1189–1199

Monarch King Richard I

1199–1216

Monarch King John

1215

King John, under baronial pressure, sealed Magna Carta, a charter limiting royal power and asserting that the king must govern according to the law.

1215–1217

When John tried to evade Magna Carta, rebel barons fought a civil war.

1216–1272

Monarch King Henry III

1272–1307

Monarch King Edward I

1307–1327

Monarch King Edward II

1315–1322

Years of torrential rain, crop failure and livestock disease caused a prolonged famine across much of northern Europe, bringing mass hunger, high mortality, and the end of earlier medieval growth.

1327–1377

Monarch King Edward III

1332

Lay Subsidy Rolls are royal tax records listing lay (non-clerical) taxpayers and their assessed wealth in order to raise money for the Crown.

A. D. Mills (ed.), Dorset Lay Subsidy Roll of 1332 (Dorset Record Society, 1971)

1348–1349

A devastating outbreak of plague killed perhaps a third or more of the population, transforming England’s economy, society and religious life.

TNA, SC 11/175

1349/50

A formal survey commissioned by the Abbot of Sherborne, listing and valuing the manor’s lands, tenants, rents, services and other profits.

The National Archives, SC 11/175: Extent of Stalbridge Weston manor, with other manors, 1348

1377–1399

Monarch King Richard II

1381

Sparked by an unpopular poll tax and long‑standing post‑plague grievances, peasants and townspeople rose in rebellion against royal officials, briefly forcing concessions before the movement was suppressed.

1399–1413

Monarch King Henry IV

1413–1422

Monarch King Henry V

1422–1461

Monarch King Henry VI

1461–1483

Monarch King Edward IV

1483

Monarch King Edward V

1483–1485

Monarch King Richard III

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The Tudor Period

1485–1603

1485–1509

Monarch King Henry VII

1485–1551

A recurrent, fast‑killing epidemic disease that struck Tudor England in several waves, intermittently depopulating households.

1509–1547

Monarch King Henry VIII

1513

Royal tax records listing lay (non-clerical) taxpayers and their assessed wealth in order to raise an money for the Crown.

‘Dorset Subsidy Roll (Tithing of Weston)’, Somerset & Dorset Notes and Queries 3 (1893–94): 192, 200.

1525

Royal tax records listing lay (non-clerical) taxpayers and their assessed wealth in order to raise money for the Crown.

The National Archives, E 179/103/120: Lay subsidy roll for Dorset, 1525.

1535

Henry VIII’s survey of ecclesiastical wealth.

Valor Ecclesiasticus, vol. 1 (London, 1810), p. 283 [Diocese of Salisbury, 'Manerium de Weston']

1539

The Dissolution of the Monasteries was Henry VIII’s 1536–1541 programme to close England and Wales’s religious houses and confiscate their property for the Crown. Sherborne’s turn came in 1539.

1539–1546

At the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the manor passed from Sherborne Abbey to the Crown. It was managed for seven years by the Court of Augmentations before Henry VIII granted it to lay owners.

1539

The 1539 muster rolls are county lists of able‑bodied men and their basic arms, compiled for Henry VIII’s planned defence against a feared French invasion.

T. L. Stoate (ed.), Dorset Tudor Muster Rolls, 1539, 1542, 1569 (Bristol: The editor, 1978).

1546

A Particulars for Grant is a royal survey or schedule describing the lands and revenues to be sold or granted by the Crown, prepared so officials could value the property and set the terms of the grant.

The National Archives, E 318/21/1150: Commissioners for the Sale of Crown Lands, Particulars for Grants, entry for Weston manor in Dorset.

19 March 1546

Held the manor for a single day on 19 March 1546 as part of a sale-and-resale conveyance, a common Tudor device for moving land between owners.

1546–1572

Clerk of the Court of Augmentations. First lay lord of the manor after the Dissolution. Held the manor for twenty-six years until his death.

1547–1553

Monarch King Edward VI

1547–1558

The Mid-Tudor Crisis marks the rapid swings between Protestant and Catholic reforms under Edward VI and Mary I, which repeatedly upended parish worship and everyday religious practice.

1547–1596

Probate documents for Weston residents relating to the Tudor period.

Various: TNA PROB series; Taunton (Somerset Heritage Centre); summarised on site

1553–1558

Monarch Queen Mary I

1558–1603

Monarch Queen Elizabeth I

1572–1608

Christina inherited the manor from her father Richard Duke and held it for thirty-six years. During much of that time, her second husband Gregory Sprint had legal control through his marriage.

1594–1597

Successive bad wheat harvests sent grain prices soaring, brought scarcity, vagrancy and occasional food riots, and hit small rural communities and their tenants especially hard.

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The Stuart Period

1603–1714

1603–1625

Monarch King James I

1603

After James I came to the throne in 1603, he quickly faced the Catholic‑led Bye Plot to kidnap him for religious toleration and the aristocratic Main Plot to depose him in favour of Arbella Stuart

1608–1610

Last of the Duke line. Inherited from his mother Christina two years before his death.

1608–1710

Probate documents for Weston residents relating to the Stuart period.

Various: TNA PROB series; Taunton (Somerset Heritage Centre); summarised on site

1610–1611

Statesman and chief minister to James I. Held the manor for a single year before sale.

1611–c.1657

Local gentry. Bought the manor from Robert Cecil and held it for nearly half a century.

1611

A manorial rental is a lord’s listing of tenants, their holdings, and the rents or services they owe, used to manage the manor’s income.

Somerset Heritage Centre, DD/WHh/456: Rental of Stalbridge Weston Manor, with court proceedings, c.1558–1612.

1625–1649

Monarch King Charles I

1641–1642

The Protestation Returns of 1641–1642 are parish lists of adult men who swore (or refused) an oath to defend the Protestant religion and the rights of Parliament on the eve of the Civil War.

Edward Alexander Fry and George Samuel Fry (eds.), Dorset Records: The Dorset Protestation Returns Preserved in the House of Lords, 1641–2, vol. 12 (Dorset, 1912).

1642–1651

Armed conflict between king and Parliament that shattered royal authority, drew in Scotland and Ireland, and ended with Charles I’s execution and Cromwell’s rise.

1642–1662

Civil War and Interregnum politics unleashed competing Protestant sects and ‘godly’ reforms, breaking parish uniformity before the Restoration re‑imposed the Church of England.

1649–1660

Monarch The Interregnum

c.1657–1663

George Thornhull’s heir. Held the manor for six years before sale to William Whitchurch.

1660–1685

Monarch King Charles II

1662

Prepared for the sale of Weston, this is an itemised list describing the individual parcels, tenancies, and rights being conveyed, attached to the deed so the extent of the manor was identified.

1663–1671

A linen draper from Frome Selwood, who bought the manor in 1663 and passed control to his son in 1671.

1663–1716

A manorial court book records the business of a manor’s courts – disputes, local bylaws, and copyhold land transfers.

The National Archives, C 116/60: Court book of Stalbridge Weston manor, with ‘Antioch’, 1663–1716.

1671–1719

Given control of the manor in 1671 by his father (William Whitchurch the Elder) and held it for forty-eight years. High Sheriff of Somerset (1691).

1685–1688

Monarch King James II

1685

The Duke of Monmouth’s failed West Country rising against James II ended in defeat at Sedgemoor and brutal reprisals in the ‘Bloody Assizes’ that scarred many local communities.

1688–1689

James II was deposed and replaced by William and Mary in a largely bloodless coup that entrenched Protestant rule and strengthened Parliament over the Crown.

1689–1702

Monarch King William III and Queen Mary II

1702–1714

Monarch Queen Anne

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The Georgian Period

1714–c.1760

1714–1727

Monarch King George I

1716–1736

Probate documents for Weston residents relating to the Georgian period.

Various: TNA PROB series; Taunton (Somerset Heritage Centre); summarised on site

1719–c.1721

The last of the Whitchurch lords of the manor. Inherited from his grandfather (William Whitchurch the Younger), and held the manor briefly before selling it to Peter Walter.

c.1721–1746

Money Scrivener. Held the manor (as well as much of the Blackmore Vale) for around twenty-five years.

1721

A detailed description and valuation of Weston’s lands, tenants and rights, made to show its actual and potential income.

Hertfordshire Archives and Local Studies (HALS), XI-C-38: ‘A survey of the Demesnes & of the Tenements of the Manor of Weston in the County of Dorset belonging to Peter Walter Esquire as the same were valued by William Whitchurch Esquire when he sold them

1727–1760

Monarch King George II

1746–1753

Inherited from Peter Walter. Held the manor for seven years.

1753–1780

Inherited from Peter Walter the Younger. Last of the Walter line.

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Stalbridge Weston Manor

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Manor History
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- Manorial Court Rolls
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Stalbridge Weston Manor

Search for:

Home
Manor History
Documents
- Manorial Court Rolls
- Wills, Inventories and Administrations
Indexes/Glossary
About

Surnames

We’ve extracted the surnames of Weston’s people and their neighbours and associates; click on a highlighted entry in the list to search for all occurrences of that surname or its variants on this site.

A B C D E F G H J K L M O P R S T V W Y

A

Addams
Atkins
Awbrey

B

Banger
Barstable
Bartlett
Baylle (Baylly)
Bennett
Biddlecomb
Bingham (Buingham)
Bishop (Buishopp, Bishopp)
Boyle
Bracher (Bracke)
Browne (Brown, Bryne, Brine)
Bullen

C

Calpen (Calpens)
Carter
Cave
Chaffey (Chaffy, Chaffie, Chaffye)
Chamberlaine (Chamberlayne, Chamberlin, Chamberlain, Chamberlyn)
Chant
Child (Chyld, Childes, Chyllys, Chyldes)
Clarke (Clark, Clerke)
Cook (Cooke)
Coombs (Coombe, Comb, Combs)
Courtney
Cross (Crosse)
Cufe
Curray

D

Darby
Devenish
Drake (Dracke)
Duffett
Durrant (Durants, Durant)
Dybbin

E

Ellis (Ellice, Elles)

F

Farvis (Vervis, Farviss, Verviss, Varvice)
Fill
Ford
Forrester (Forrister)
Frampton
Fudge

G

Gawler
Gawtrell (Garetrell, Gartrell, Gawterell, Gauterell)
Gilbert
Glover
Gooslyng
Goseney (Gosney, Golsney)
Gove
Gray (Graye)

H

Halett (Hallett)
Hancock (Hancocke, Hancat, Handcocke)
Hann
Hardyn
Hellier (Hellyer, Helier, Helyar, Hillier, Hillyer, Heller)
Hill
Hobbs (Hobs)
Hooper (Hoper)
Hutchins (Hewchens)

J

Jabarde
Jeanes (Jenes, Janes)
Jeffrey (Jeffreys)
Jeustere
Jolliffe (Joyliffe, Jooleph, Jellof)

K

Keate
Kember (Kimber, Kemball)
Keylway

L

Lambert
Lane
Langman (Longman)
Laurence (Laurencz)
Lewis
Light
Locke (Lock)
Loder (Loader, Lorder)
Lodge
Lush
Lymon (Lymyn)
Lynington (Linington)

M

Marks
Maudeslie
Meaden
Miles (Myles, Milles, Mills)
Milward
Moss
Mydwynter

O

Oliver

P

Palentone
Parsons
Paviatt (Paviat, Pavett, Parlet, Paulet, Pavot, Pavott)
Pearce (Peers)
Pemker
Perkins
Peryn
Pinne (Pinn, Pine)
Ploughman
Pond
Pope

R

Radgar
Ridout

S

Sachiverill
Sadler
Sandell
Seager
Serjeant (Seriant, Sergeant, Sergent)
Seymour
Shephard
Smith
Snooke (Snook, Snake, Snoke)
Stone
Strayer
Stronge

T

Tayler
Thornhull (Thornhill, Thornehull)
Tiler (Tyler)
Toogood (Togood, Torgood)
Towker (Touker)
Townsend
Turner
Tyte (Tite)

V

Vincent

W

Watts (Wattes)
Weston (le Calewe, de Caleweweston, de Weston)

Y

Young (Yong)

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